


once there was a tree

by GiuGiu



Series: TUA Kid Fics [4]
Category: The Umbrella Academy (TV)
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Character Death Fix, Fix-It, Gen, Kid Fic, Light Angst, grace is alive
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-29
Updated: 2019-06-29
Packaged: 2020-05-30 18:27:23
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,553
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19408891
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/GiuGiu/pseuds/GiuGiu
Summary: She looks at the display on the wall. She’s dusted it countless times. There are many prized insects pinned within the gleaming glass case.The insects are rare or extremely beautiful or both. So it is odd, that in the corner, sits an Eastern Tiger Swallowtail. It is yellow, but it doesn’t shine for attention. It sits quietly in its death, seemingly content to have simply lived at all.Grace blinks.A fix-it where they dig Grace out of the ruins of the mansion but her memory files are damaged.Or, a robot coma dream sequence type of thing.





	once there was a tree

**Author's Note:**

> So, I don't know anything about computers or robots... please don't hate me and my horribly incorrect descriptions and vocab use...
> 
> This was just an idea that possessed me and wrote itself.

01001101 01100101 01101101 01101111 01110010 01111001 00100000 01000110 01101001 01101100 01100101 00100000 01010010 01100101 01100010 01101111 01101111 01110100

Grace blinks. Grace blinks and is met with a whirl of colors. 

“Oh,” she sighs, “what a lovely place.” The sun is bouncing off of the flora around her. Vivid greens and blues and yellows meet in delicious patterns. Like a glorious Monet. She can hear the rhythmic splashing of water in a fountain and the high-pitched screams of delighted children. 

A yellow insect flies by, wings extended to catch the breeze that carries it away. 01000101 01100001 01110011 01110100 01100101 01110010 01101110 00100000 01010100 01101001 01100111 01100101 01110010 00100000 01010011 01110111 01100001 01101100 01101100 01101111 01110111 01110100 01100001 01101001 01101100 -- an Eastern Tiger Swallowtail.

A gentle hand on her arm pulls her attention away from the butterfly’s graceful flight. She stares at the man in front of her. He looks familiar. Grace blinks. He smiles at her.

“Diego,” her mouth says, seemingly without the code even being processed. She smiles at him. “Would you like a treat, dear?” She can hear the happy chimes of an icecream truck not far from their position.

Her boy looks at her like she is valuable. 

Grace blinks.

01001101 01100101 01101101 01101111 01110010 01111001 00100000 01000110 01101001 01101100 01100101 00100000 01010010 01100101 01100010 01101111 01101111 01110100

Grace blinks. Grace blinks and braces herself for impact as a small child throws herself into her arms. “Goodness,” she whispers into the black curls brushing against her face. The little girl is squeezing her arms around Grace’s shoulders and pushing her head into Grace’s neck. Hesitantly, Grace raises her hand and rubs the child’s back in a way that feels natural, a frequently used code. “What’s the matter?” She asks the shaking being.

The girl pulls away and Grace notes the watery streaks dripping down her face. “Four and Six,” the girl sobs and then breaks out into fresh cries.

And suddenly Grace knows. This heartbroken child is familiar. She’s more than familiar. “Number Three.” Grace says and the girl looks up, waiting for more. Grace blinks. Buffering. Her code feels strange. Perhaps she needs to reboot.

“Your brothers aren’t letting you join their game.” Grace realizes. Remembers. Why had she not known that immediately?

Number Three nods emphatically, causing her shiny curls to bounce and shimmer in the warm kitchen light. Grace caresses the girl’s cheek. “Why don’t you help me make the banana bread, darling? I could use an extra pair of hands.” 

Grace blinks. 

She’s holding a banana. Grace blinks. 

“Mommy, are you okay?” A concerned voice asks. A little girl is standing beside her, a mixing bowl cradled in her small hands. 

Grace stares at her. “Oh.” When did they make all of that batter? She looks at the girl. She looks familiar. 

Grace blinks.

“Goodness, what’s the matter?” She asks the crying girl, there are watery streaks dripping down her face. 

“I’m sorry, Mommy.” The girl hiccups. “I didn’t mean to drop it.” Grace belatedly notices the shattered blue ceramic bowl on the floor, and the sticky batter spreading across the tiles. 

“Oh, that’s alright, Allison, dear. Accidents happen.” She smiles at her daughter. The girl wipes a tear off her cheek and furrows her brow.

“Who’s Allison?”

Grace blinks.

01001101 01100101 01101101 01101111 01110010 01111001 00100000 01000110 01101001 01101100 01100101 00100000 01010010 01100101 01100010 01101111 01101111 01110100

Grace blinks. Grace blinks and notes the dust motes swirling through the beams of light in the foyer. The house is silent. It is silent in a way that feels foreign. She hears no feet on squeaky floorboards. No music whispering through the ornate halls. No laughter echoing up from the kitchen.

She watches the dust motes and wonders why the house is so quiet. Are her children sleeping? Surely, not at this hour. And if they were on a mission, wouldn’t her lovely Vanya be playing her violin?

Grace blinks. Five’s room is empty.

Grace blinks. Diego’s room is empty. As is Klaus’, and Vanya’s, and Luther’s, and Allison’s, and Ben’s. She checks the library. She checks the courtyard. She checks the basement and the attic. With each room she searches, her code processes faster and faster. Where are her children?

Where are her children?

Where are her children?

Where are her children?

“Grace.” A gentle voice calls to her, pulling her from the loop of thought. Dr. Pogo stands before her, a frown playing on his lips. She smiles at the chimpanzee, she found someone. “Are you looking for something?” 

“Someone,” Grace corrects him politely. “I can’t seem to find any of the children.” Grace blinks. “I wonder what they want for dinner.”

Dr. Pogo steps closer. His quiet demeanor makes Grace wonder if she’s made a mistake. “Grace,” he says slowly. “Master Luther departed a month ago. Don’t you remember?”

Luther.

Grace blinks. 

Grace blinks and cards her fingers through the soft blond fuzz on her charge’s head. “Gwace,” Number One greets her, tugging on her skirt. “Canyoureadmeastory?” The little boy blurts it out quickly, as if already resigned to being told no.

“Of course, darling. What story would you like to read together?”

“Dis one,” he holds up a book with a tree and a little boy on the bright green cover.

Grace blinks. And she remembers.

Her code flutters beneath her eyelids. Her children are gone? Her children are gone. Her children are gone.

They are all gone. What is a life without purpose?

She feels like a dust mote. Sifting slowly to the floor, lifeless.

Grace blinks.

01001101 01100101 01101101 01101111 01110010 01111001 00100000 01000110 01101001 01101100 01100101 00100000 01010010 01100101 01100010 01101111 01101111 01110100

Grace blinks. Grace blinks and runs.

Her heels click on the floor. She isn’t sure why she is running, but her code tells her it’s urgent. She enters the foyer.

Her son is sprawled at the bottom of the staircase. Abstractly, she thinks as she rushes to kneel beside him, this scene would make a beautiful painting. Number Four’s skin is a stark white, broken up with smears of crimson blood on his nose and mouth and chin and left cheek. His vibrant green eyes are wide open, scared. He’s wearing a red dress that Grace knows belongs to Number Three, and he has a glossy red pump on his right foot. A matching one is scattered a foot away.

They’re her shoes.

Her boy sits up and looks at her. He holds his face and she knows there’s something wrong.

“It will be okay, Number Four.” She comforts him. 

He looks at her with betrayal.

Grace blinks.

Diego looks at her with wet eyes as she works on her needlepoint.

“It’s gonna be okay.” The moon falls from her hand.

Grace blinks.

01001101 01100101 01101101 01101111 01110010 01111001 00100000 01000110 01101001 01101100 01100101 00100000 01010010 01100101 01100010 01101111 01101111 01110100

Grace blinks. Grace blinks and is confused.

Wasn’t she with Klaus just a moment ago? And wasn’t she speaking to Dr. Pogo? What happened to the banana bread?

“An’ dis one?” The boy asks, his hands cupped carefully around something valuable. She steps closer and he opens his hands slightly to show her the insect cradled within. 01000101 01100001 01110011 01110100 01100101 01110010 01101110 00100000 01010100 01101001 01100111 01100101 01110010 00100000 01010011 01110111 01100001 01101100 01101100 01101111 01110111 01110100 01100001 01101001 01101100

“An Eastern Tiger Swallowtail,” she tells him, watching in wonderment as he nods seriously and let’s the insect fly away. Number Five picks up the notebook and pencil beside him. 

“How do you spell it?” He has the pencil at the ready, preparing to record his finding.

Grace blinks. How did she get here?

“Where is Klaus?” She asks the boy. Her son is injured. She needs to find him. The little boy pouts up at her. 

“How do you spell Eaturn Tiger Sailortell?” He repeats stubbornly. Grace blinks.

“Oh.” She kneels in the dirt, uncaring for her white skirt’s cleanliness. “When did you come back?” She questions her son. How many years had she longed for his return? How many nights had she mourned at his portrait?

Grace blinks.

“An’ dis one?” The boy asks, his hands cupped carefully around something valuable.

Grace blinks.

A yellow insect flies by, wings extended to catch the breeze that carries it away.

Grace blinks. She needs to get icecream for Diego.

A small hand pats her forearm. “Mom?”

She shakes herself. “Oh. When did you come back?”

Grace blinks.

01001101 01100101 01101101 01101111 01110010 01111001 00100000 01000110 01101001 01101100 01100101 00100000 01010010 01100101 01100010 01101111 01101111 01110100

Grace blinks. Grace blinks and is met with warmth. Her charges are gathered around her on the carpet as she sits in a rocking chair. A cheery green book with a tree and a boy on the cover sits in her lap.

“ Once there was a tree And she loved the little boy. And every day the boy would come. And he would gather her leaves. And make them into crowns and play king of the forest. He would climb up her trunk. And swing from her branches. And when he was tired he would sleep in her shade.”

She makes sure all of the children can clearly see the illustration. She watches as the four-year-olds lean forward as one, all of them eager for more.

“And the boy loved the tree very much. And the tree was happy.”

Grace blinks. 

Dr. Pogo stands in front of her. She feels like a dust mote.

Grace blinks.

“ But time went by, and the boy grew older. And the tree was often alone.”

Grace blinks.

“The moon is not a safe place,” she warns her children.

Grace blinks.

01001101 01100101 01101101 01101111 01110010 01111001 00100000 01000110 01101001 01101100 01100101 00100000 01010010 01100101 01100010 01101111 01101111 01110100

Grace blinks. Grace blinks and listens as Vanya and Ben tell her about their spelling test scores. “We got them all correct,” Ben brags as he chews on a freshly baked cookie. Beside him, Vanya blushes and stares at her cookie, too shy or humble to sing her own praises.

“Well done,” she tells them, gifting them with glasses of milk. “I am so proud of you two.”

She turns away to wash the ceramic mixing bowl.

“Mom!” A voice shouts, fear etched into the word. She turns. But only Ben and Vanya are in the kitchen. And neither of them are even looking at her.

Grace blinks.

“Diego?” She calls, because she’s sure it was him who yelled for her.

“Mom!”

Grace dries her hands and marches out of the kitchen. “Klaus?” Her sons need her.

Grace blinks. She doesn’t see her sons but she can hear them.

“Mom!” They both scream. “Get out of there! Now!”

She darts up the stairs. Are her sons safe? She needs to find them.

Grace blinks. 

“Mom, can I have another cookie?” Ben asks with a wet stripe of milk across his upper lip. No, that’s not right.

She left the kitchen. How is she still in the kitchen? Her code feels strange. Perhaps she needs to reboot.

Grace blinks.

01001101 01100101 01101101 01101111 01110010 01111001 00100000 01000110 01101001 01101100 01100101 00100000 01010010 01100101 01100010 01101111 01101111 01110100

Grace blinks. Grace blinks and she eavesdrops.

“W-w-w-wait. She’s not just a vacuum cleaner you can throw in the closet! She feels things, I’ve seen it!”

Grace wonders if that’s true. 

“I am too busy to climb trees," said the boy. "I want a house to keep me warm," he said. "I want a wife and I want children, and so I need a house. Can you give me a house?" 

"I have no house," said the tree. “The forest is my house," said the tree, "but you may cut off my branches and build a house. Then you will be happy." And so the boy cut off her branches and carried them away to build a house. 

And the tree was happy. 

But the boy stayed away for a long time and the tree was sad. And when he came back, the tree was so happy she could hardly speak.

Grace eavesdrops as her children vote on whether or not they should turn her off.

She says nothing.

She looks at the display on the wall. She’s dusted it countless times. There are many prized insects pinned within the gleaming glass case.

The insects are rare or extremely beautiful or both. So it is odd, that in the corner, sits an Eastern Tiger Swallowtail. It is yellow, but it doesn’t shine for attention. It sits quietly in its death, seemingly content to have simply lived at all.

Grace blinks.

01001101 01100101 01101101 01101111 01110010 01111001 00100000 01000110 01101001 01101100 01100101 00100000 01010010 01100101 01100010 01101111 01101111 01110100

Grace blinks. Grace blinks and stares at Ben.

No, not Ben. She stares at his statue. The statue that is no more alive than she is. Sir Reginald seems to be fond of creating imitations of humanity.

She stares and stares and stares at the statue.  A gentle hand on her arm pulls her attention away from the reminder of her son. “Diego,” her mouth says, seemingly without the code even being processed. She smiles at him. “How are you?”

She can see the red around his eyes and knows he was crying. She knows all her children were. 

“M-M-Mom,” he bites his lip in frustration. “I-I,”

“Remember, Diego, just picture the word in your mind.” She is proud of him. Somehow, she can feel her pride bubble up past the agony that is flooding her very circuits. 

“I n-need to-to go.” He looks at her with wet eyes, pleading. Pleading for permission. 

For a moment, silence sits between them. Silence that is foreign. Silence that will be familiar.

“Sail away and be happy,” she quotes from the little green book her children had once cherished. She holds his face in her hands for a moment, fearing it will be her last chance.

That evening, Diego left with a small duffel bag and a tupperware of cookies.

And Grace was happy, but not really.

Grace blinks.

After a long time, the boy comes back.

He will hover near her as she admires her paintings. “What a wonderful world she lives in! Sometimes I wonder if she’s lonely.”

Grace blinks. 

“The moon is a pivotal feature,” Sir Reginald tells Dr. Pogo in hushed tones behind the closed door of his study.

Grace blinks. 

After a long time, the boy comes back.

She looks up from her needlepoint. The moon is not a safe place.

“It’s gonna be o-”

“Remember, what we worked on.” She prompts, admiring her boy’s face. She missed him. “Picture the word in your mind.” 

“It’s gonna be okay.”

Grace shuts down.

  
  


01010010 01100101 01100010 01101111 01101111 01110100 00100000 01001111 01110000 01100101 01110010 01100001 01110100 01101001 01101111 01101110 01100001 01101100 00100000 01010011 01111001 01110011 01110100 01100101 01101101 01110011

Grace wakes up.

Her children lay on the floor around her, asleep. They are dirty, covered in soot and ash and dust. They are obviously exhausted.

Grace, herself, is broken, she can feel several systems not responding. She is scratched and torn and rough. But… her children came back for her.

And the tree was happy.

01101000 01100001 01110000 01110000 01111001

**Author's Note:**

> The binary code says stuff, I used this website:  
> https://www.qbit.it/lab/bintext.php
> 
> So... yeah. I don't know if this made any sense or was interesting at all... hopefully you guys don't hate it :)


End file.
